… The main title of this column is a bit misleading but I thought it was kinda cool … “Low roads” is a secondary subject today. All you are hearing about Winged Foot is TIGER MISSED THE CUT …. not here … here you will learn about “that itty bitty bathroom” in the WFGC hallway. …. Tar Heel baseballers are a bunch of Moochies …. Caniacs compared to NASCAR fans ….
As you fly into White Plains NY it looks like you are flying over the Amazon basin … nothing but an aboreal canopy beneath you. Instead of the Amazon, you have a couple of east-west and north-south highways (excuse me … “Parkways”). The county fathers of Westchester County love trees and hate signs as there are bazillions of the former and damn few of the latter. Westchester (where Mamaroneck is) is non-resident unfriendly. If you don’t know where you’re going and exactly how to get there you have about as much chance as Hansel and Gretel of getting there. Having said that …
The per square foot price of ground in Westchester County has to be as pricey as any anywhere, but there are no shortage of old country clubs under that arboreal canopy. Winged Foot is the most famous and the site of the current Tiger-less U.S. Open.
My wanderings have taken me to this venerable Tillinghast creation about 6-7 times. My memories are different than Butch Harmon’s or Fuzzy Zoellar’s. Butch’s dad, Claude, was the longtime head pro at “The Foot”.
When I think of Winged Foot I think about
- The oil leak through the parking lot
- All the J-Lo lookalikes on the service staff
- The very bumpy cart ride
- No Internet service
- The itty bitty phone booth and even itty bittier rest room
My very first visit, about 8 years ago, I had an Avis rental that somehow had a fluid leak. As I drove thru the property I trailed oil or brake fluid in a line behind me. The road stain was still there a few years later. I forgot to look last year. Hey, it’s not like I meant to.
Last Fall I was there for a charity golf event for the NY Rangers. I was having an early morning
cup of coffee in the Men’s Grill as the service staff was rolling silverware for the banquet that evening. All the waitresses looked like “Jenny from the hood” and even talked like her. Hispanics girls in their 20s jabbering about their boyfriends and their favorite brand of stilletos. I am pretty sure very few of them lived within 20 miles. I have no idea how many were “legal”. They were pretty and it was fun listening to them jabber.
Winged Foot has bazillions of oak and elm trees as you can see on TV. Very old trees with exposed roots and almost exposed roots. Two problems at WFGC … (1) there are two courses (East and West … the Open uses a combination of the two to form their 18). The courses are very poorly labeled and intersect. Like driving around Westchester … if you don’t know your way, don’t expect any help. (2) those old trees and their old roots make for a filling-rattling cart ride. Imagine “speed bumps” every 10’ and you have an idea.
Last year I needed to receive an e-mail and asked the GM if I could have it sent to them. They did not have Internet. I made do. I also needed to burn some data to a CD … I “made do” without that too. Maybe the GM knew I was the guy that messed up the parking lot?
Winged Foot is “old”. Not like “grandparents old” … more like “great grandparents old”. It revels in its “oldness”. If a TPC club is your idea of “a country/golf club” this might not be your cup o’ tea. All the pictures in the lobby and hallways are black & white and are of golfers who knew Bobby Jones (not the UNC guy … the golf guy). In the main hallway are two itty bitty rooms … one is a phone booth (with a ROTARY dial!) … the other may be the itty bittiest rest room anywhere. HOW itty bitty is it , BobLee?
WELL … you could NOT get “three rich boorish white boys and one ‘honor student and single mother of 
two car stealing bi-polar ho’ in that room with a shoe horn. Heck, two skinny midgets could hardly hug in that room. There is a plaque on the wall just outside indicating the members currently on the greens committee. Frank Gifford’s name is on the list. As I sat there in the unisex facilty I wondered if “Kathy Lee” had ever sat where I was sitting. If so, there was no plaque indicating it. … … so much for my memories of Winged Foot Golf Club. As I said, different from Fuzzy’s.
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Re: “The Long Road” … On our recent trip to The Outer Banks we “went” the Edenton route and “came back” via 64 through Manteo and Plymouth. Both ways take “forever and an hour”. I realize that is part of the charm … just like cracking lobster is part of that culinary “experience”. I don’t want to work that hard to eat or travel that far to “go to da beach”.
Re: “The Low Road” … Ann Coulter truly does not like Liberals. It is not a contrived act. Every column and/or book she has ever written reinforces her dislike of Liberals. It apparently shocked her adversaries that her latest book was in line with everything else she has ever written. Most authors have to pay for the free publicity Ann got over her “nasty comments about Liberals”. No doubt Ann was hoping Hillary would write the glowing foreward to her next book … NOT! Hillary and Matt Lauer and the rest of the Liberal media establishment were shocked … SO hundreds of thousands of Conservatives who despise Hillary and Matt Lauer and the Liberal media establishment rushed out to buy the book. Ann Wins … Ann Wins! Thank Yeeew, Mrs Clinton!
The only difference between Ann Coulter and Maureen Dowd (aka MoDo) is that Ann has longer legs and longer hair. Both “journalists” are “bombthrowers” who delight their adoring fans with clever insults about “those people”. “Those people” being “those morons who do not believe what we believe” about how America should be run. There is NO High Road any more in political punditry. That “art” has deteriorated like comedy clubs where the “winner” is whoever uses the most f-bombs in their act.
When hard core political partisans get soooo indignant and squawk about what the other side says about them they sound just like message board howler monkeys … dish it out but can’t take it. That comparison is as insulting as it gets.
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I watched the Tar Heels beat Cal State Fullerton in extra innings early Saturday morning. Hooray for The Heels! My two impressions.
(1) I still hate aluminum bats. I understand the economics of aluminum versus wood. I j
ust hate that “plink” sound. I yearn for “the crack of the bat”. Find a way to make aluminum bats “crack” instead of “plink” and I’ll be fine.
(2) The Tar Heels all look like “Moochie”. Hopefully some of you other than Coby and Little Ricky remember “Moochie of the Little League” on Walt Disney. Played by Kevin Corcoran, “Moochie” was the classic toe-headed kid with his cap pulled down over his eyes and uniform two sizes too big … but giving it his “all”. Maybe it’s the batting helmets or maybe it’s the 40 years difference in my age and theirs. Especially the lead-off batter … He IS Moochie!
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Saturday night the ‘Canes might win The Stanley Cup, or not. If yes, those whizbang Raleigh City Fathers are planning, GET THIS, (1) a victory lap around the Canadian Bank Building AND (2) a reception with ice cre
am and punch. I TOLD YOU Raleigh does not deserve a sports championship. The same Mayor (Charlie Meeker) that decreed the infamous “4th Place Wuff Parade” now decrees “a reception with ice cream and punch”.
Golly gee willikers, you’d think “da Mayor” would at least let Barney turn on his sireeen and maybe even the blue light.
Sort of related … Dennis Rogers did a great piece in Saturday’s N&O comparing hockey fans to NASCAR fans.
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Swagger’s Stumper
What former “Senator” was known as
“the Washington Monument”?
(I love this question.)
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Crabby Appleton was “rotten to the core” but Tom Terrific and Mighty Manfred thwarted his evil schemes.
Book reviews from SSays readers should be pouring in within the next 48 hours. I told Bob Greene to expect a sales “spike”.
95% of everything about Sidney Lowe’s hiring is almost a verbatim repeat of John Bunting’s hiring. Only the Saint Paul’s thingie is different. Sidney is “bleeding red” and promising to restore the traditions he so loves. He is still giddy about getting the job. In other words … just like Burly John was as he unpacked six years ago.
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